A group of Simpson men build a fire inside an igloo where they roast marshmallows, eat Swedish fish, and tell ghost stories. Freshman Alex Reuss downloads “The Higgledy-Piggledy Palace,” a fairy tale, onto his phone and begins to read aloud. Senior Garrett Holt, junior Evan Gensler, sophomore Colin Wilson, and freshman Ian Gensler pass around a bag of Swedish Fish as they listen intently.
The igloo is small enough that it warms up quickly, but smoke can’t funnel out of the hole in the roof fast enough. Finally, Reuss has to stop reading and the men scramble out into the clean night air. Later the group jumps on the roof to destroy the melting igloo, putting an end to their midnight excursion.
“It reminds me of the Dead Poets Society,” sophomore Hannah Leitner said. “In the movie they go into a cave at night and read poetry to each other.”
On Sunday, Feb. 16, sophomore Betsy Thistleton found herself digging through a snow pile behind Central Hall with Holt and Evan.
“Garrett and I talked about how we wanted to tunnel through the snow a while ago, because that would just be fun,” Thistleton said. “I was just watching the Olympics when Garrett called and said, ‘Come behind Central Hall in 10 minutes, we’re going to build an igloo.’ So I was like, sweet, abandoned all other plans like homework, and went to build an igloo.”
This is not the first time Holt has built an igloo behind Central Hall.
“Last time we made an igloo almost in the same spot, me and Alex Gage,” Holt said. “We tried to sleep in there. That was a terrible life choice. Alex left halfway through the night, and I would have but I forgot the keys to Simpson.”
Evan also has experience in building igloos, but believes this is the best igloo he’s ever created.
“When I was younger, we used to build little tunnels and igloos, but never to this extent,” Evan said. “This is by far the Taj Mahal of my snow forts.”
By Tuesday night, a combination of rising temperatures inside and outside the igloo forced the group to condemn their handiwork.
Holt believes the igloo melted so soon because they forgot to christen it.
“That’s a huge oversight. That’s why it melted, because we didn’t give it our blessing,” Holt said. “Number one in fort building: christen it. Give it a name. Give it your blessing. Don’t forget it. We did, and you saw what happened.”
Holt and Evan both hope to build more igloos in the future.
“We’ve been scoping out a few other mounds, but we don’t want to make any promises to the student body of where our next igloo will show up,” Evan said.
Because it is getting so warm this week, Holt is unsure as to whether or not another igloo will be built soon.
“If there’s another snowstorm we’d love to,” Holt said. “It’s kind of a fun way to get away from homework.”
